A concert on Monday night at New Yorkās Radio City Music Hall was a special occasion for Frank Miller: his parentsā wedding anniversary. He didnāt end up seeing the show ā and before he could even get past security, he was informed that he was in fact banned for life from the venue and all other properties owned by Madison Square Garden (MSG).
After scanning his ticket and promptly being pulled aside by security, Miller was told by staff that he was barred from the MSG properties for an incident at the Garden in 2021. But Miller says he hasnāt been to the venue in nearly two decades.
āThey hand me a piece of paper letting me know that Iāve been added to a ban list,ā Miller says. āThereās a trespass notice if I ever show up on any MSG property ever again,ā which includes venues like Radio City, the Beacon Theatre, the Sphere, and the Chicago Theatre.
He was baffled at first. Then it dawned on him: this was probably about a T-shirt he designed years ago. MSG Entertainment wonāt say what happened with Miller or how he was picked out of the crowd, but he suspects he was identified via controversial facial recognition systems that the company deploys at its venues.
In 2017, 1990s New York Knicks star Charles Oakley was forcibly removed from his seat near Knicks owner and Madison Square Garden CEO James Dolan. The high-profile incident later spiraled into an ongoing legal battle. For Miller, Oakley was an āintegralā part of the ā90s Knicks, he says. With his background in graphic design, he made a shirt in the style of the old team logo that read, āBan Dolanā ā a reference to the infamous scuffle.
A few years later, in 2021, a friend of Millerās wore a Ban Dolan shirt to a Knicks game and was kicked out and banned from future events. That incident spawned ESPN segments and news articles and validated what many fans saw as a pettiness on Dolan and MSGās part for going after individual fans who criticized team ownership.
But this week, Miller wasnāt wearing a Ban Dolan shirt; he wasnāt even at a Knicks game. His friend who was kicked out for the shirt tagged him in social media posts as the designer when it happened, but Miller, who lives in Seattle, hadnāt attended an event in New York in years.
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